“Final roses” floated down the aisles of the Capitol Theatre Tuesday as eager attendees sat down to listen to and chat with a former star of ABC’s hit network show, “The Bachelorette.”
Michelle Young, runner-up of season 25 of “The Bachelor” and star of its female counterpart in 2021, “The Bachelorette,” was interviewed over a range of topics, including her time on set, navigating starring on a television show during the height of the COVID-19 epidemic and her current education non-profit.
Young’s season began differently than most. When the filming process began in July of 2021, she recalled frequently being swabbed for testing and quarantining in her hotel room for eight days in a row. She also lamented being unable to experience any of the lavish traveling typical of each season, but said she was grateful to still make the trip to her hometown of Minneapolis, Minnesota, for the show’s customary hometown visits.
When discussing the production process, Young said she didn’t get the chance to view any of the edited footage before it aired.
“You don’t watch it beforehand,” Young said. “I wish you did, because that would’ve relieved a lot of anxiety.”
A former teacher, Young currently runs her own non-profit to provide educational opportunities for underserved students called The Michelle Young Foundation. The organization works to create scholarships and education programming, according to its website.
“I would hop on Zoom with my students and notice a huge discrepancy between my students whose parents were out buying them arts and crafts and activities to do…and the students who didn’t have access to any of that,” Young said.
Young also experienced changes in her romantic life. After she and her “Bachelorette” ex-fiance broke off the engagement in 2022, she recalled feeling no sense of strong direction in several aspects of her life for the first time, prompting her to begin a period of “soul-searching.”
Currently, Young lives in Minnesota with her husband, Jack Leius, whom she married in October 2025, and their two dogs.
“I was very lost for a little bit,” Young said. “I needed to go through that to figure out who I was and what I wanted. And when I stopped looking, that’s when Jack popped up.”
